Sentiment Turns

In a welcome turn of events, the market was resoundingly upbeat this week. The pace of transactions picked up notably across sectors, and we can’t help but view this as a positive sign for the financing market going forward.

On the M&A front Excel and Quintana successfully closed their merger. Each issued and outstanding share of Quintana common stock was converted into the right to receive $13.00 in cash and 0.3979 Excel Class A common shares. The merger creates a combined company that oper­ates a fleet of 47 vessels with a total carrying capacity of approximately 3.7 million DWT and an average age of approximately eight years. Stamatis Molaris stepped into the role of CEO of the combined company, while Hans Mende, Corbin Robertson III and Paul Cornell joined its board of directors. We were happy to hear that the deal was executed smoothly. Moreover, Nordea and the under­writing team were successful in syndicating the debt levels required to make the deal possible – without needing to bring market flex provisions into play.

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